RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1984 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572 151 Hong Kong authorities saw no need to take active steps to improve the situation. Parliamentary pressure over social hygiene in Hong Kong largely lapsed after 1894 once the legal framework for the licensing of prostitutes and the registration of brothels had been repealed by the Legislative Council and thereafter Hong Kong was left free to set up its new extra-legal system of control without further interference from London. But after the end of the First World War agitation on the subject revived. The League of Nations appointed an Advisory Committee on the Traffic in Women and Children which published reports highlighting the connections between state regulation of prostitution and the procurement of women. The first warning to Hong Kong of the revival of concern in Britain was the arrival in the colony in 1921 of a Commission from the National Council for Combating Venereal Disease which had been sent out to report on conditions in the Far Eastern Colonies. The Governor, Sir Edward Stubbs, had objected to any such visit and forbade government officials to give the commissioners any assistance; he also informed them when they arrived that they were not to hold any public meetings or advertise their presence in the press. In spite of this studied discourtesy the commissioners, Mrs. Neville-Rolfe and Dr. Hallam, set out upon a thorough exploration of the seedier areas of the city and various medical institutions, and were able to make contact with some business and religious groups and with some of the leading Chinese. On their return to London they submitted a scathing report to the Colonial Office on medical and social conditions. According to the commissioners, no serious attempt had been made by the government to improve the standard of health of the native population in 85 years of British rule; the infant mortality figures were disgraceful; the Tung Wah hospital was very dirty and badly equipped; the Po Leung Kuk, a place of refuge for Chinese girls, was largely used as a recruiting ground for cheap supplementary wives by members of the committee. The Colonial Office was given its first description of the working of the system of tolerated brothels, which Mrs. Neville-Rolfe dismissed as ineffective in preventing the kidnapping of girls into brothel slavery; on the contrary it was alleged that the artificial value put on the Chinese girl by the system of recognised brothels is the main inducement to the kidnappers. ================================================================================ RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊 | RAS-1984 https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/5h73wh572 160 R.J. MINERS 15 Knutsford to Des Voeux, 12 Dec. 1890 and Des Voeux to Knutsford, 13 April 1891 in Parliamentary Papers 1894 LVII pp. 26-27, nos. 5 and 6. 16 See for example CO129/218 p. 487, letter to the Secretary of State from the National Association for the Repeal of the Contagious Diseases Act, 28 March 1884. 17 Ripon to Robinson, 17 March 1893 in Parliamentary Papers 1894 LVII p. 39, no. 13. 18 Robinson to Ripon, 17 June 1893 with enclosures in Parliamentary Papers 1894 LVII pp. 46-52, no. 17. 19 See the tabulated returns for Straits Settlements and Hong Kong in CO129/286 pp. 86-87. 20 See CO882/6 Confidential Print Eastern no. 69 Correspondence regarding the Measures to be Adopted for Checking the Spread of Venereal Disease 1894-1899; Minute by Sir Edward Wingfield at CO129/276 p. 132. 21 J. Chamberlain to Governor Sir H.A. Blake, 11 May 1899 in CO882/6 p. 117. 22 Minute by J. Chamberlain, 25 Jan. 1898 in CO129/276 p. 132. 23 This possibility had been mentioned earlier in an unpublished letter from the Attorney General; see minute in CO129/286 p. 75 dated 18 March 1899. 24 Memorandum by Secretary for Chinese Affairs, 4 June 1923 in CO129/480 pp. 254-259. 25 The following paragraphs are based on the S.C.A. memorandum; a long description by Dr. Wellington, Director of Medical and Sanitary Services, not dated item 5 in CO129/533/10 of 1931; and note by the Chief Justice, J.H. Kemp dated 16 May 1931, item 3 in CO129/533/10. 26 Macfarlane and Aubrey: Journal of the Hong Kong University Medical Society, Vol. 1 April 1922, quoted in CO129/480 p. 260. 27 In CO129/472 pp. 356-382, April 1921. 28 See CO129/474 pp. 338-358; CO129/484, pp. 257-8; CO129/485 pp. 2-18 and 122-6. 29 See CO129/472 pp. 603-5; CO129/475 pp. 326-331; CO129/483 pp. 66-75 and pp. 156-170. 30 Straits Settlements Legislative Council Sessional Papers 1923: Report of the Venereal Diseases Committee, 17 December 1923, pp. C286-327; CO882/11 Confidential Print Eastern no. 147 Correspondence 1923-1925 Relating to Social Hygiene in Singapore. 31 First Report of the Advisory Committee on Social Hygiene, August 1925 Cmd 2501. See also Report of a Committee appointed by the Secretary of State for the Colonies to examine and report on Straits Settlements Ordinance no. 15 of 1927, March 1929, Cmd 3294. 32 CO129/522/3. 33 Unpublished memoir by Sir William Peel deposited at Rhodes House, Oxford. House of Commons Debates, 27 June 1930 p. 1500, speech by Dr. D. Shiels. 34 Peel to Passfield, 22 August 1930 in CO129/522/3. 35 Peel to Passfield, 9 June 1931 in CO129/533/10. ================================================================================